White House press secretary Jay Carney said Monday that the administration had no deadline for determining definitively whether Syria had used chemical weapons.
"What I won't do is speculate about how much time might be required to gather the evidence necessary to be able to assess clearly, in a way that has been corroborated and reviewed, whether or not this red line has been crossed," Carney said. "I think all Americans would hope and expect that on a matter this serious that we would be very careful in this process and insist that we gather all the facts."

William Kristol wants to go to war in Syria, but he won't say what that war should look like. Appearing on Fox News Sunday to discuss reports of chemical weapons attacks in Syria, the Weekly Standard
editor (and noted Iraq war hawk) attacked President Obama as "totally
irresponsible" for indicating that he doesn't want "to start another
war," saying: "You've got to do what you've got to do."

The EPA says another lesson of is that tar sands spills can send harmful air pollution, such as benzene, into nearby communities.
"Given these concerns, it is important to ensure that the future response and remediation plans will protect communities from impacts due to spills," the EPA's letter statesThe EPA wants the State Department to require TransCanada to be ready, in case of a spill, with special equipment on hand to contain and clean up sunken oil. It also wants TransCanada to set up additional systems to detect leaks early, especially in ecologically sensitive areas and places where the pipeline crosses streams or near drinking water wells.

Apparently the State Department (and really who better to contemplate pipelines?) thought it would just be another pipeline system, as opposed to a toxic timebomb. It's almost as if they just took what the lobbyists told them at face value.
But still, as we've been repeatedly told by our brave politicians, the whole point of the pipeline is to get all that delicious crude into America's gas tanks for energy independence.

Oil Change International, a group fighting the Keystone pipeline, argues that is clearly not true. The group used census and U.S. energy data to figure out how much is now exported from the Texas refineries expected to handle the majority of Keystone oil.
They found 60 percent of the finished gasoline produced last year in those refineries was exported.
“Keystone XL proponents are saying this is about energy independence and obviously it’s not,” Oil Change International executive director Steve Kretzmann said in an interview.

It is really just about someone saying in about two-decades they couldn't have anticipated such a disaster, while all the decision-makers have retired to considerable pensions -- far away from the middle of the country.
[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Saturday, April 27, 2013

David Greene: Your husband has kept a pretty low
profile since leaving office. But one thing that’s gotten some attention
recently is his new hobby, painting. How did that come about?Laura Bush: He was looking for a pastime. He got an
app on his iPad where he could draw pictures. He communicated with me if
I was on the road and with Barbara and Jenna with funny drawings.David Greene: He was drawing you pictures to send you while you were on the road?Laura Bush: Yeah, like he’d draw a picture of him in bed with Barney and the cat.

I'm going to guess it was a mix of 3-year old, Robert Mapplethorpe, and Dogs Playing Poker.

The hunt is on for a gunman who police say sprayed two North
Philadelphia blocks using a high-powered assault rifle in separate
shootings that killed one and wounded three others earlier this month.

“We’ve already had one person killed and three others shot,” Homicide
Unit Capt. James Clark said during a news conference Friday. “Quite
frankly, we could have a lot more killed.”

...

“As he’s running away, he’s sort of just firing in the air, so
he’s a very dangerous person,” Clark said. “We have to get him off the
street as quickly as possible.”

A week later, on April 13, a gunman matching the description of the
gunman opened fire on two men at 7th and Clearfield streets – about
seven blocks from the scene of the first shooting. Police said the 23
shell casings recovered at that scene matched those found at the scene
April 6. Both victims in that shooting, men aged 19 and 36, survived
their gunshot wounds, said 25th District Capt. Frank Vanore.

Surveillance video from the second shooting shows sparks flying as
bullets ricochet off the street and buildings and the victims running to
escape the gunfire.

Friday, April 26, 2013

Rescue workers in Bangladesh on Friday rushed to find survivors of
Wednesday's horrific garment-factory collapse—but the death toll
nevertheless climbed above 300, more than three times as high as initial reports...

The collapse is the worst workplace accident in Bangladesh history,
surpassing the fire that killed 112 five months ago, and workers have
taken to the streets around the capital of Dhakar in protest of poor
safety standards and workplace conditions , in some cases forcing
factories to shut down. In response, police fired rubber bullets and
tear gas.

The rubber bullets and tear gas for protesting mass deaths from negligence is a nice touch the Koch Brothers could appreciate.

Florida violated federal civil rights law with its new and unusual
requirement that unemployment claimants file online and take math and
reading tests before they can receive benefits, the U.S. Labor
Department determined this month.

They also want drug-testing while the guy (and you know it was a guy, a white guy, a white Republican guy) who wrote it is probably addicted to prescription medication and cannot add or write beyond a 4th degree level -- or as it is known in Florida, a State University Grad.*

Thursday, April 25, 2013

At least you'll get high for a while...so it has more value than this.

The New York Times Global Forum: Thomas L. Friedman’s The Next New World,
scheduled for June 20, promises to “explore the complex dynamics of
new-world infrastructure, especially the transformative electronic,
digital and mobile environment,” impart “invaluable insights into
strategies for success in today’s new world order,” and answer the
question: “What World Are You Living In?” Invitees can attend the
one-day forum for the early-bird price of $995.

If you do not learn enough, fear not I'm sure "The Mustache of Understanding" will have all the answers for you within six months.

More than six million Spaniards were out of work in the first quarter
of this year, raising the jobless rate in the euro zone's fourth
biggest economy to 27.2 percent, the highest since records began in the
1970s.

The huge sums poured into the global financial system by major
central banks have eased bond market pressure on Spain, but the cuts
Madrid has made in spending to regain investors' confidence have left it
deep in recession.

When a hearing to explore how to get the long-term unemployed back to
work kicked off on Wednesday morning, only one lawmaker was in
attendance. That was Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who was holding the hearing in
her role as the vice chair of the Joint Economic Committee. The Joint
Economic Commitee is one of a handful of committees whose members come
from both parties and both houses of Congress. Klobuchar was eventually
joined by three colleagues (in order of their appearance): Connecticut
Sen. Chris Murphy, Maryland Rep. John Delaney and Maryland Rep. Elijah
Cummings. All four are Democrats.

In fairness, the GOP members had stints on all the cable news networks to show up for.

It's bad enough that Iowa has a district (not my district thank goodness) represented by the stupid and loathsome Steve King.

But the determination of several Republicans in the Iowa Legislature to do their impression is the kind of thing that is bound to keep the GOP on the cutting edge of social issues -- in that they will bleed badly from them.

A group of conservatives in the Iowa state House have filed a measure
that would cut the pay of state Supreme Court Justices by around 80
percent — but only for the ones who voted to legalize same sex marriage
in 2009.
...

But Republican state Reps. Tom Shaw and Dwayne Alons insisted to The Gazette on Tuesday that the reduction in pay was not a punishment.

“It’s our responsibility to maintain the balance of power,” Shaw
explained. “We’re just holding them responsible for their decision, for
going beyond their bounds.”

Yeah, it's not a punishment, it's just for voting in a manner we don't like. Totally not punishment.

Hard to believe that unassailable logic, huh?'

Meanwhile, in Iowa, like the rest of the nation, the public has come to accept gay marriage in ever increasing numbers.

Wednesday, April 24, 2013

This
is Rep. Stella Tremblay. She is a Republican elected to New Hampshire's
House of Representatives and she believes the government planned the
bombing at the Boston Marathon last week that killed three people and
injured more than 150 others.

Tremblay posted on Glenn Beck's Facebook
wall last week, saying that the search for the suspects was going
exactly as he'd suggested it would. She then goes on to suggest that the
U.S. government planned to whole thing, but for what reason she does
not specify. The message was posted Friday morning, before Dzhokhar
Tsarnaev was arrested, for some context.

Since 1998, the specific issues that appear most frequently in [the
Agricultural Retailers Association and Fertilizer Institute’s] lobbying
disclosure reports are bills dealing with the safety and security of
chemical facilities. During that period, the Agricultural
Retailers Association has spent a cumulative $2.9 million on lobbying
while the Fertilizer Institute has spent even more, some $14.4 million,
according to data in Influence Explorer.

In a lobbying disclosure on file with the Senate, the Agricultural Retailers Association clearly states its opposition to EPA regulation of fertilizer safety.

Fertilizer plant blows up because of lack of funding for inspection and regulation?

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) on Tuesday unveiled a report
on last's year attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that
blames then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for lapses in security...The 46-page report by the five committees of jurisdiction concludes that
reductions in security levels prior to the attack that killed
Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were approved
at the highest levels of the State Department, including by Clinton
herself.

I wonder if a major fact was completely ignored by the same group that doesn't believe in global warming or evolution -- hard as that may be to believe.

"In 2011 they [The GOP controlled House] came in and passed a continuing resolution for the
remainder of that fiscal year. The House proposed $70 million cut in the
WSP [Worldwide Security Program for the State Department] and they proposed a $204 million cut in Embassy security," says Mr.
Lilly. "Then the next year, fiscal 2012, they cut worldwide security by
$145 million and embassy security by $376 million. This year's bill is
the same thing all over again. The House has cut the worldwide security
budget $149 million below the request."

Tuesday, April 23, 2013

I just hope and pray that it contains a wing dedicated to "quality poetry" like it will have a wing dedicated to "Good Ideas" (y'know like two wars, tax cuts, pushing high-risk home loans, doughnut holes, torture, and a special display of how to open Chinese Doors and Umbrellas).

In a handwritten note to Caren Teves, whose son Alex died trying to
protect his girlfriend during the Aurora, Colo. theater shooting, Flake
said he was “truly sorry” for her loss and vowed that “strengthening
background checks is something we agree on.” His letter was a follow-up
response after he and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) were criticized for
initially sending rote form letters to the mother in response to her grievances.

Buried in one line of an Ohio Valley Herald Star report
on local business is the news that Steubenville High School football
coach Reno Saccocia was approved for a two-year administrative contract
by the Steubenville school board over the weekend.

...

For those who don’t remember Soccocia, he is the football coach who,
according to text messages and witness testimony at the Steubenville
rape trial, knew about the rape of a 16-year-old girl by two of his
players but didn’t report the crime to school administrators or law enforcement officials, as he is obligated to do under Ohio law.

For years conservatives, primarily Republicans have been screaming against immigration reform that allows illegals any kind of residency in this country, let alone into the mainstream -- primary because that would involve doing something positive for Latinos.

Monday, April 22, 2013

Local 25 was contacted by some concerned citizens of Medford asking for
help to keep members of the Westboro Baptist Church from protesting the
funeral of Krystle Campbell, scheduled for tomorrow morning at 10 AM in
Medford.

Local 25 President Sean O’Brien asked all off-duty Teamsters to participate:

Teamsters Local 25 will be out in full force tomorrow morning at St.
Joseph’s Church in Medford to form a human shield and block the Westboro
Baptist Church from protesting the funeral of Krystle Campbell. The
Campbell family and friends have already endured immeasurable amounts of
heartache and tragedy this week, and deserve a peaceful funeral with
time to grieve privately.

Westboro Baptist Church should understand that we will go to great
lengths to make sure they don't protest any funerals of the victims of
the past week’s tragedies, and that those we lost receive a proper
burial.

Teamsters Local 25 represents 11,000 hardworking men and women from the Boston area.

One of his officers put his cruiser into gear and jumped out of it,
letting it roll at the suspects to draw fire, he said. The suspects
peppered the car with bullets.

After several minutes, the elder brother, Tamerlan, walked toward the
officers, firing his gun until he appeared to run out of bullets,
Deveau said. Officers tackled him and were trying to get handcuffs on
him, when the stolen SUV came roaring at them, the younger brother at
the wheel. The officers scattered and the SUV plowed over Tamerlan
Tsarnaev, who was dragged briefly under the car, he said.

Dzhokar Tsarnaev abandoned the SUV almost immediately on a nearby street and fled on foot, triggering an all-day manhunt.

There are a lot of possible explanations for such an action IF that is actually what happened: from error, to panic, to anger, to a determination to shut him up.

...columnist Chris Nogy encouraged his fellow Republicans to utilize their 2nd Amendment rights to make sure that lawmakers — particularly Republicans who vote with Democrats — are held accountable...

The 2nd amendment means nothing unless those in power believe you would have no problem simply walking up and shooting them if they got too far out of line and stopped responding as representatives.

Not the party of evolution.
Of course, we may soon learn that the other Party isn't always better when it comes to things like the Keystone Pipeline.
The last day for the public to write (hopefully not) in futility their comments is today.
So go here -- keystonecomments@state.gov -- if you wish to file your resistance.

Greg Ball, a state senator in New York, suggested Friday that
authorities should "torture" the captured Boston bombing
suspect, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who is a naturalized American citizen and
remains in serious condition at an area hospital.

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Neighbors say three have been arrested in New Bedford in connection with the Boston Bombing suspect.

Police apprehended suspects from the Hidden Brook Apartments on
Carriage Drive in New Bedford. Neighbors say they think that the
girlfriend of 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev may have lived in the
complex and they have seen him in the area as recently as yesterday.

Dzhokhar is a student at the nearby University of Massachusetts
Dartmouth. Earlier on Friday his brother, also a suspect in the Boston
Marathon bombing, was killed in a gun fight with police.

Former South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford must appear in court two
days after running for a vacant congressional seat to answer a complaint
that he trespassed at his ex-wife's home, according to court documents
acquired by The Associated Press on Tuesday.

The complaint says Jenny Sanford confronted Sanford
leaving her Sullivans Island home on Feb. 3 by a rear door, using his
cell phone for a flashlight...

The complaint filed by Jenny Sanford's lawyer, Deena Smith McRackan,
said that Mark Sanford has "entered into a pattern of entering onto
plaintiff's property. Plaintiff has informed defendant on a number of
occasions that this behavior is in violation of the court's order and
has demanded that it not occur again."...

"I am doing my best not to get in the way of his race," Jenny Sanford
told the AP. "I want him to sink or swim on his own. For the sake of my
children I'm trying my best not to get in the way, but he makes things
difficult for me when he does things like trespassing."

Thatcher is being given a ceremonial funeral – not officially a state
funeral, which requires a vote in Parliament. Still, the proceedings
will feature the same level of pomp and honor afforded Princess Diana in
1997 and the Queen Mother Elizabeth in 2002.

Karl Rove exhanged e-mails about Pat Tillman with Associated Press
reporter Ron Fournier, under the subject line "H-E-R-O." In response to
Mr. Fournier's e-mail, Mr. Rove asked, "How does our country continue to
produce men and women like this," to which Mr. Fournier replied, "The
Lord creates men and women like this all over the world. But only the
great and free countries allow them to flourish. Keep up the fight."

There's always another ass to kiss inappropriately whether the pants are wet or not, isn't there Ron?

There's no greater despair that I feel right now about politics ("chained-ennui"?) than the fact that about nine-tenths of the country wants at least background checks and the small side represented by THIS is still winning.

An 11-year-old boy brought an AR-15 and a white flag with the words
"Come and Take It" to a rally at the New Hampshire State House Saturday,
the Union Leader reported.

Organized by the Granite State Patriots Liberty PAC, the "Honor Your
Oath" rally charged that lawmakers who voted to repeal the state's
"Stand Your Ground" law last month violated their oaths of office and
should be impeached, according to the Union Leader. The rally organizers
said the event was not "gun rally."

...even as attitudes continue to shift among most Americans, Republicans
have been slow to embrace the change. The NBC/WSJ poll showed that 66
percent of Republicans are opposed to same-sex marriage — a stark
contrast to the 73 percent of Democrats who support giving gay and
lesbian couples the right to tie the knot. That level of opposition may
place national Republican leaders who are trying to soften the party's
stance on issues related to gay rights in an awkward position.

Anything beyond missionary (gimp suits excepted) is an awkward position for the GOP base.

Americans often cannot quite understand that our determination to mythologize other leaders is not always shared by that leader's fellow citizens. But I have no doubt Thatcher would totally agree with this bullying action.

Campaigners reacted angrily tonight after Scotland Yard suggested protesters should consider avoiding Baroness Thatcher’s cortège – because they face arrest under a controversial public order law.
A Metropolitan Police spokesman told The Independent that demonstrators were more likely than usual to be held under Section 5 of the Public Order Act, because mourners are considered particularly vulnerable to suffering distress.

There is, of course, a tad bit of difference between protesting at or near the funeral of a former political leader and the actions of the folks of Westboro Baptist Church.
Maybe they could just play this song -- a big hit -- within a few hundred yards of the procession?
[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Sunday, April 14, 2013

Russia on Saturday banned 18 Americans from entering the country in
response to Washington imposing sanctions on 18 Russians for alleged
human rights violations.

The list released by the Foreign Ministry includes John Yoo, a former
U.S. Justice Department official who wrote legal memos authorizing
harsh interrogation techniques; David Addington, the chief of staff for
former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney; and two former commanders of the
Guantanamo Bay detention center: retired Maj. Gen. Geoffrey Miller and
Adm. Jeffrey Harbeson.

The move came a day after the U.S. announced its sanctions
under the Magnitsky Law, named for Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who
was arrested in 2008 for tax evasion after accusing Russian police
officials of stealing $230 million in tax rebates. He died in prison the
next year, allegedly after being beaten and denied medical treatment.

Saturday, April 13, 2013

How shocking from a National Review asshole, and there's no bigger one than Daniel Pipes.

Western governments should support the malign dictatorship of Bashar Assad.

Here
is my logic for this reluctant suggestion: Evil forces pose less danger
to us when they make war on each other. This (1) keeps them focused
locally and (2) prevents either one from emerging victorious (and
thereby posing a yet-greater danger). Western powers should guide
enemies to stalemate by helping whichever side is losing, so as to
prolong the conflict.

In 2012 Maine, which has three parties, the two traditional ones and
an independent party managed to make sure that only two candidates ran
for office.

They did so, in no small part, because of what happened in their Governor's race in 2010.
And with 38 percent of the vote they got this guy.

Maine
Gov. Paul LePage (R) recently bullied state workers to resolve
unemployment claim disputes in favor of businesses, according to an investigation by the Maine Sun Journal published on Thursday. According to the paper's report,
LePage called a mandatory meeting on March 21 with more than a dozen
state Department of Labor employees. He allegedly scolded the hearing
officers and their supervisors, complaining that they too often decided
against businesses that challenge laid-off workers' unemployment claims.

Yes,
how dare judges independently apply the law to provide assistance to
people fired -- often in the name of better executive bonuses.

Take a dip in the Great Lakes these days, and you might get more than
you bargained for. That's because, in addition to the water, fish and
plant life you might normally expect, the region's waterways are
increasingly clogged with plastic debris, according to researchers.

A Republican Congressman cited the biblical flood as an example of climate change that had not been caused by humans. Texas Rep. Joe Barton made those remarks Wednesday at the Subcommittee on Energy and Power hearing on H.R. 3, the Northern Route Approval Act, a bill that would give Congress the authority approve the Keystone pipeline.
"I don't think it's a secret that I'm a proponent and supporter of the Keystone pipeline," Barton said.

Of.Course.You.Are.

So to be clear, we must approved a potentially environmentally catastrophic pipeline because not only could humans cause it to be faulty -- or nature -- but God might also get in on the act and who are we to deny him a good solid smiting opportunity?

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Each witness testified they were fearful Blakely's driving would cause an accident.

"He was taking his hand, wetting his mouth, and masturbating," Sturgill said.

"At over 90 miles per hour, he had his penis out [the window]... he
was masturbating... and that's when it got really, really bad. I
wouldn't look over any more, and I wrote his tag number down on my hand,
which I believe he noticed, and he exited very quickly," Street said.

Obama's judicial nominees wait an average of 116 days
on the Senate floor for a vote, which is three times longer than the
average wait for President George W. Bush's nominees. Many nominations
stall even after being passed out of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Which Mitch said is them being "totally fair". After all they have to ponder their potential mental health issues.

Feminism is a "very dangerous" phenomenon that could lead to the destruction of Russia, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church has said.

"I
consider this phenomenon called feminism very dangerous, because
feminist organisations proclaim the pseudo-freedom of women, which, in
the first place, must appear outside of marriage and outside of the
family," said Patriarch Kirill, according to the Interfax news agency.

"Man
has his gaze turned outward – he must work, make money – and woman must
be focused inwards, where her children are, where her home is," Kirill
said. "If this incredibly important function of women is destroyed then
everything will be destroyed – the family and, if you wish, the
motherland."

"It's not for nothing that we call Russia the motherland," he said.

A vocal supporter and close ally of Vladimir Putin, Patriarch Kirill has helped spearhead Russia's turn toward conservative values. He supported the case against Pussy Riot,
the anti-Kremlin feminist punk band tried after performing a song
criticising Putin and the church's explicit support of him, inside a
Moscow cathedral. During their trial, prosecutors argued, successfully,
that feminism when proclaimed inside a church was heretical.

Women, worse than Stalin.

Yeah, that whole Pussy Riot prosecution worked wonders in world opinion.

Until women are allowed to take their fairly earned place in politics everywhere, men are going to be paranoid about lady-parts.

While President Barack Obama was delivering an emotional plea
on Monday about gun control legislation, Senate Minority Leader Mitch
McConnell (R-Ky.) announced that he will be among those filibustering
the gun package that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) is
trying to bring up.

"Sen. McConnell opposes the Reid bill," McConnell spokesman Don
Stewart said in a statement. "While nobody knows yet what Sen. Reid’s
plan is for the gun bill, if he chooses to file cloture on the motion to
proceed to the Reid bill, Sen. McConnell will oppose cloture on
proceeding to that bill."

McConnell is the fifteenth Republican to join the filibuster effort being led by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.).

Here's somebody pulling no punches, I agree with Glenn Greenwald on this:

Exactly the same is true of Thatcher. There's something distinctively creepy - in a Roman sort of way
- about this mandated ritual that our political leaders must be
heralded and consecrated as saints upon death. This is accomplished by
this baseless moral precept that it is gauche or worse to balance the
gushing praise for them upon death with valid criticisms. There is
absolutely nothing wrong with loathing Margaret Thatcher or any other
person with political influence and power based upon perceived bad acts,
and that doesn't change simply because they die. If anything, it
becomes more compelling to commemorate those bad acts upon death as the
only antidote against a society erecting a false and jingoistically
self-serving history.

When Reagan died...after several years of dementia which forced him into a relative non-existence, he received the last fumes of the ethos of the first term of George W. Bush -- NEVER SAY ANYTHING CRITICAL about a Republican or what the country did.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark, April 8 (Reuters) - The Republican-led Arkansas state
Senate approved a measure on Monday that would require random drug
testing of Arkansas residents who receive state unemployment benefits -
a plan that the state's Democratic governor said could violate federal
law.The bill, which passed on a 25-5 vote and
now goes to a House committee, could affect about 85,000 Arkansas
residents currently receiving unemployment benefits.If
the measure becomes law, those seeking unemployment benefits would
have to sign a waiver and allow for random drug testing. Those who
refuse to sign or who test positive for drugs would not be entitled to
benefits.

I'm sure the Vatican was ready with the cutting and the pasting on this one:

Pope
Francis on Monday hailed Britain's former prime minister Margaret
Thatcher for her "promotion of freedom" and said he was "saddened" by
her passing.

The Argentine pope "recalls with appreciation the
Christian values which underpinned her commitment to public service and
to the promotion of freedom among the family of nations," a condolence
note read.

The overwhelming occupants of the Falkland
Islands (500,000 of them to less than 3,000 bipeds) did not bah a
comment about that whole "promotion of freedom" thing.

...last week, in one of his many appearances on Fox News,
Carson stepped on a political land mine when he compared homosexuality
to bestiality and pedophilia in explaining his opposition to gay
marriage.

“As you know, I have been in the national news quite a bit recently
and my 36 year association with Johns Hopkins has unfortunately dragged
our institution into the spotlight as well. I am sorry for any
embarrassment this has caused,” wrote Carson, who is the director of
pediatric neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital. “But what really
saddens me is that my poorly chosen words caused pain for some members
of our community and for that I offer a most sincere and heartfelt
apology. Hurting others is diametrically opposed to who I am and what I
believe.”

Carson said he has not changed his views on gay marriage, but that he recognizes he erred badly in expressing his opinion.

“There are many lessons to be learned when venturing into the
political world and this is one I will not forget. Although I do believe
marriage is between a man and a woman, there are much less offensive
ways to make that point. I hope all will look at a lifetime of service
over some poorly chosen words,” he said.

The latest creepy relic from the darkest recesses of the Dickensian
past that appears to be making a comeback these days are debtors’
prisons. Debtors’ prisons show up in a number of Dickens’ novels, most
notably Little Dorrit, which is one of his masterpieces. George
Bernard Shaw claimed it converted him to socialism and called it “a
more seditious book than Das Kapital.” Dickens surely knew from
debtors’ prisons, since his chronically impecunious father had been in
one. And now, as Think Progress reports,
this reviled institution is being revived, and poor people in Ohio are
being thrown in the clink for being unable to pay off debts — mostly
legal fees and court fines. On Friday, Ohio’s ACLU released a report about the state’s debtors’ prisons, and it is a sobering and quietly enraging read.

Among the findings of the report:— Being imprisoned for debt is clearing unconstitutional and was
declared so by the U.S. Supreme Court over 20 years ago. It is also
against Ohio law.— People are being jailed for failure to pay fines and court costs, sometimes for amounts as low as a few hundred dollars. — It’s affecting many people — as many as 20% of the bookings in the
Huron County jail in the second half of 2012, for example. In two other
counties, in one six-week period in 2012, a total of at least 120 people
were jailed.— Sentence lengths vary. One woman went to jail for ten days for
being unable to pay $300 in overdue legal fines. A man who owed $1,500
in court fines and was behind in child support payments was sent to
prison for three and half years.— The law requires that you are entitled to a hearing to
determine if you are able to pay court costs. Needless to say, none of
these folks got that. Nor did they any of them receive a court-appointed
attorney (are you joking?).— Also? This practice makes no economic sense whatsoever. The court
costs, cost of serving a warrant, cost of jailing these folks, etc.,
generally adds up to far more than the defendant owed in the first
place.

There was never any doubt that eventually the moral vacancy of the US Drone program would be put in the starkest light:

An American military airstrike in eastern Afghanistan near the Pakistan border was reported to have killed 18 people, including at least one senior Taliban commander but also women and children, raising the thorny issue of civilian casualties for the third time in roughly a week.

"I just don't see how displaying open bigotry and contempt for people should be such a big deal for the people who are the victims. Plus, who cares about groups expressing opinions that differ from me...everybody be the same!

Suck it up, white people like me did during all our years of being oppressed."

Saturday, April 06, 2013

31-year old Jennifer Derrebery reportedly worked for Gingrich's election
contractor Stillwater LLC and, according to prosecutors, turned in
campaign petitions with some 400 signatures in the failed attempt to
collect the 10,000 needed for Gingrich's name to appear on the primary
ballot last year. According to WVIR, nearly all of the signatures
submitted by Derrebery were fake.

Thirty-eight days before the attack on the Century Aurora 16 movie
theater, the psychiatrist treating suspect James Holmes told a police
officer that her patient had confessed homicidal thoughts and was a
danger to the public, according to newly unsealed court documents in the
murder case against Holmes.
The psychiatrist, Dr. Lynne Fenton, also told the officer that
Holmes had stopped seeing her and had been threatening her in text
messages and e-mails, the documents state. The officer, Lynn Whitten,
responded by deactivating Holmes' key-card access to secure areas of
University of Colorado medical campus buildings, according to search
warrant affidavits.

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) said that the United States should be
prepared to launch a pre-emptive strike "right now" against North Korea,
warning that its "deranged" president Kim Jong Un could attempt a
nuclear attack on America...

“In terms of the capability we have out there with the F-22s and the
battleships … a pre-emptive strike from something like that would get
their attention.’’

And as a self-proclaimed "born-again Christian" what clearer explanation of WWJD than bombing somebody first.

"Our intelligence system has said that we know that Saddam Hussein has
weapons of mass destruction -- I believe including nuclear. There's not
one person on this panel who would tell you unequivocally that he
doesn't have the missile means now, or is nearly getting the missile
means to deliver a weapon of mass destruction. And I for one am not
willing to wait for that to happen."

Not even a million dollars could convince Lady Gaga to perform during last summer's Republican National Convention.

The snub by the pop star is included in a
lawsuit filed by a powerful Republican nonprofit fundraising
organization, American Action Network, against a vendor whose job was to
stage entertainment just outside the doors to the GOP's convention in
August.

Documents filed with the lawsuit show that
other entertainers also said "no thanks" to appearing at the GOP
convention including Dolly Parton and the rapper Pitbull, who
Republicans hoped to feature at an event for the Hispanic Leadership
Network.

Congress's "troll in residence," Rep. Louie Gohmert, managed to link limits on high-capacity gun magazines to gay marriage to bestiality in three moves...

And I pointed out, well, once you make it ten (rounds in a magazine), then why would you draw
the line at ten? What's wrong with nine? Or eleven? And the problem is
once you draw that limit ; it's kind of like marriage when you say it's
not a man and a woman any more, then why not have three men and one
woman, or four women and one man, or why not somebody has a love for an
animal?

Wednesday, April 03, 2013

Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli has filed a petition
with the 4th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in Richmond asking the full
15-judge court to reconsider a decision by a three-judge panel last
month that overturned the state’s sodomy law.

The three-judge panel ruled 2-1 on March 12 that a section of
Virginia’s “Crimes Against Nature” statute that outlaws sodomy between
consenting adults, gay or straight, is unconstitutional based on a U.S.
Supreme Court decision in 2003 known as Lawrence v. Texas.

But last week saw a setback for the forces of maximum freedom. A representative of millions of gays and lesbians went to the Supreme Court and asked the court to help put limits on their own freedom of choice. They asked for marriage.
Marriage is one of those institutions — along with religion and military service — that restricts freedom. Marriage is about making a commitment that binds you for decades to come. It narrows your options on how you will spend your time, money and attention.
Whether they understood it or not, the gays and lesbians represented at the court committed themselves to a certain agenda. They committed themselves to an institution that involves surrendering autonomy. They committed themselves to the idea that these self-restrictions should be reinforced by the state. They committed themselves to the idea that lifestyle choices are not just private affairs but work better when they are embedded in law.
And far from being baffled by this attempt to use state power to restrict individual choice, most Americans seem to be applauding it.

It's so bad one you know it is a botched attempt at parody...but Bobo apparently doesn't know you cannot parody a self-parody.

It makes one harken back to the 1860s after the Thirteenth Amendment passed and Bobo's great great great uncle, Preston Bully-Bob Petunia Brooks, wrote in the Charleston Times-Lynchmob:

Whether they understood it or not, the Negroes represented at the court committed themselves to a certain agenda. They committed themselves to an institution that involves having to put their own roof over their nappy heads. They committed themselves to the idea that these self-restrictions should be reinforced by the state. They committed themselves to the idea that lifestyle choices are not just private affairs but work better when they are embedded in law.

A federal prosecutor has reportedly left a case involving members of the Aryan Brotherhood of Texas citing "security concerns."
The Dallas Morning News reports that Houston-based assistant U.S. attorney Jay Hileman told defense lawyer Richard O. Ely II that he was withdrawing in an email.
Ely is representing one of the defendants in the case, which involves racketeering charges.

The United Nations' overwhelming approval Tuesday of an arms trade treaty opposed by the National Rifle Association (NRA) sets up a showdown between President Obama and the powerful gun lobby's friends on Capitol Hill.
President Obama is expected to sign the treaty within the next few months after the United States joined 153 other countries in supporting the treaty.

The treaties whole purpose is to create national standards throughout the globe to ensure that their arms exports aren't likely to be used to harm civilians or violate human-rights.
Naturally, the NRA and all of its bought souls (okay, souls is debatable) CAN. NOT. HAVE. THAT.
At least they are in league with the right bedfellows:

The U.N. panel considering the treaty broke up last week after failing to reach consensus amid objections from North Korea, Syria and Iran.

A Texas
prosecutor and his wife who were shot dead over the weekend may have
been the targets of a white supremacist group, a US congressman said on
Monday.Republican Ted Poe speculated that the Aryan Brotherhood
may have carried out the killings of Kaufman County district attorney
Mike McLelland, 63, and his wife, Cynthia, 65.

The couple were
killed two months after Mark Hasse, the assistant district attorney for
Kaufman County, was shot dead. Kaufman County was among a number of
agencies to have brought a racketeering case against the Aryan
Brotherhood, a white supremacist prison gang. In December the Texas
department of public safety had warned the Brotherhood was "actively
planning retaliation against law enforcement officials".